I've heard that they have become less user-friendly in later iterations, but I'm using a 10-year-ish old Brother (PDF user manual is dated 2009, so the design is at least that old), and all I've done in that time is feed it paper and change the toner once. They were (and may still be) well-built and inexpensive, and they're reasonably fast (mine is 22 ppm, vs my previous 1994-design LaserJet 4+ that was far heavier and did 12 ppm). Somewhat ironically, the old 12 ppm print speed would be just fine for anything I needed to do these days - I don't do big prints - but the Brother has a very-low-power mode that the HP didn't, so it costs very little to keep it on and ready to accept AirPrint jobs.
If all it takes to be a corporate shill is "it's inexpensive, it's reliable, and it's easy to use and maintain, based on over 10 years of personal use", then they owe me a few hundred bucks in commissions.
